


The Privilege Of Rank

by Britpacker



Series: Life On Earth [5]
Category: Star Trek: Enterprise
Genre: Future Fic, M/M, Not Canon Compliant, Semi-Public Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-02
Updated: 2017-05-02
Packaged: 2018-10-27 00:40:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10798125
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Britpacker/pseuds/Britpacker
Summary: As the former crew of the museum-piece NX-01 gather in the mess hall following their private tour, Captain Tucker lures Commander Reed away somewhere more interesting....





	The Privilege Of Rank

Glasses clinked through the low hum of small-talk that rolled around the mess hall. Captain Charles Tucker the Third chewed obediently through a stale goats’ cheese and rocket tartlet that might have been made from unrecycled plasma conduit, his slitted blue stare shifting restlessly over the melee. “Cap’n, I thought we were just here for the tour,” he hissed at the first familiar figure to pass his shadowed alcove. 

Jonathan Archer hesitated, eyebrows raised. “Sorry. Callin’ you Admiral just don’t have the same ring.”

“I need someone to get me used to it.” A smooth shoulder-turn sent Admiral Leonard sailing right by with his mouth hanging open. “How’s the food?”

“Reminding me Chef wasn’t so bad after all.” When he’d noticed Lieutenant Travis Mayweather discreetly dropping half a canapé into the nearest recycling unit Tucker had stopped feeling so bad about the mini pizzas he’d stuffed through the counter grating earlier. “Where’d they order this stuff in from, Vulcan?”

“I think they had to lay it out before we came on board,” Archer reminded him soothingly. Trip rolled his eyes.

“Cap’n – Admiral – hell, whatever! You don’t have to pull all that diplomatic shit with me. Chef’s gonna need therapy by the time we get off the ship!”

“If I hear Admiral Douglas telling me how proud I am that you’ve all risen to the challenge of making the old lady look like we’re still aboard I’ll be right ahead of him.” Swivelling on his heel to conceal the words, Archer risked a scowl the older man’s way. “It was good of you to give up your diving helmet though. I know how much it means to you.”

“Mal says it’s a dust-trap, and since he’s the one that winds up doin' the dusting most days…”

“He told you to get rid of it, huh?” Jade eyes twinkled too knowingly. Trip huffed.

“Malcolm wouldn’t do that, but it seemed like an opportunity t’ put it to good use,” he hedged, surreptitiously scanning the crowd for his husband’s glossy dark head. “Figure it was more of a sacrifice for him to give up those original E.M barrier drawings. He’s real proud of them.”

“He should be. There are a lot of specialists in the field who’d love to claim his work!”

“Malcolm doesn’t care about the credit, that’s his problem.” Anxious, Trip returned to the serious business of checking out the territory, his eyes magnetically drawn to the spare, upright figure somehow making a smart dove-grey civilian suit look as military as any uniform. “’scuse me. Looks like he’s gotten pinned down by Admiral Douglas and that Vulcan secretary – you know, the one that still mouths _P’Jem_ every time he think nobody’s looking…”

“I thought they were recalling him!” 

“He’s _connected_ , according to T’Pol.” Who was standing on Reed’s right looking as near as she could bring herself to fighting mad. “Uh, maybe we should mount a joint mission here? Figure your old First Officer’s about ready to cause a diplomatic incident.”

“I’d prefer to sell tickets for the show, but – agreed.” Secretly Tucker wished he had the former Chief Tactical Officer rather than the captain at his side. Jon’s plans weren’t always the subtlest, and winging it had never been his preferred mode of operation. “Um, excuse me, Admiral – you mind if I borrow Captain T’Pol a minute?”

That wasn’t helping him, Tucker decided grimly as the senior admiral present shooed Starfleet’s first non-human commanding officer into Archer’s path; and how was he supposed to disengage Malcolm now?

“If you’ll be kind enough to excuse me, gentlemen, I believe Captain Tucker owes me a drink.” Never one to be rescued when he could extricate himself first Malcolm Reed eased through the gap between Vulcan and table left by T’Pol’s departure, dipping his lush sable lashes the blond’s way. While the secretary’s nostrils flared in an approximation of horror, Douglas flushed an unappealing shade of puce. 

“Malcolm? You did that flirty thing on purpose, right?”

“Darling if I’d tried to be professional they wouldn’t have been embarrassed enough to let us go, would they?” Coyly smiling Reed tucked a hand into his husband’s, making sure the matched gold bands on their fingers flashed beneath the strong shipboard lights. “I thought T’Pol was going to go for Secretary Tal’s throat for a minute there - when he started deploring the _great cultural and artistic losses_ Vulcan’s suffered in recent years…”

“Treasures like their fancy great listening post inside the monastery?” Vulcan diplomats. Too dumb to notice when their goddamn superiority complexes made them look like jackasses. Tucker suspected he shouldn’t be glad about that.

“Nice to know some of them are still hypocritical bastards - I can’t get used to this _all-friends-together_ malarkey,” Reed remarked cheerfully. “D’ you think anyone’d notice if we disappeared for a minute? I’m starting to feel a bit… stifled.”

“You and me both, babe.” The endearment got a dagger’s glance, but when he hustled the slighter man safely through the mess doors Tucker figured he’d earned forgiveness. “How did we get talked into this?”

“I seem to remember it being a three-line whip – be there or else,” Reed amended hastily. Trip grunted.

“Johnny’s enjoying his power too much,” he growled, allowing himself to be guided right into the nearest turbolift. “Where are we goin’, Mal?”

“Who gives a shit?” Firmly locking the door behind them, Reed sagged back against the bulkhead and closed his eyes. “Oh, this is bliss!”

Trip figured he could make it a whole lot more blissful just by leaning down a little way. When his mouth covered his husband’s, Malcolm seemed inclined to agree.

Lazily deepening the kiss the blond stretched a hand back, sealing their little capsule off from the rest of the universe. He didn’t notice the pad of his thumb grazing the next button – knew nothing until the lift slowed to a halt and the faint, exasperated hum of whirring motors permeated his sensual daze. “Whoops. Figure we’re on E Deck.”

“As long as it’s got no brass-hats running around it, who cares?” Blinking like a man roused from the sweetest sleep Reed smiled and pushed onto his toes, feathering his tongue around his spouse’s swollen lips. “Fancy a romantic stroll to Sickbay?”

“It’s not the same without Phlox’s critters squealin’ every time the doors open.” Something wicked tickled the back of his mind and once the itch was there Trip knew there’d be no getting rid of it.

Unless Malcolm whacked it right back out for him. Which was always possible if he didn’t play his hand very carefully.

Casual, he released the door and stepped back, ushering the brunet onto into the hall with a cocky smile. “Guess now I’m Cap’n Tucker I got visiting rights down here,” he drawled, offering his hand. Reed took it readily, lacing their fingers together. “It’s not like Admiral Archer’s gonna need it anymore.”

“I didn’t get to see what he put in there – Porthos’s spare bed I suppose.” When they’d done the full tour every nosy crewman who’d never got above D Deck during their cruise had snatched the opportunity to fondle the top man’s soft furnishings. Malcolm grinned up at his husband, so unsuspecting that Trip knew a brief, sharp pang of guilt. “I’m sure he wouldn’t mind…”

With a flourishing bow Trip directed the Englishman through the open doors of Captain Archer’s quarters, careful to toe the dog bed farther from the hall. “Porthos’d hate sleeping in a draught,” he said. Malcolm grinned.

“I got the impression Porthos spent more time over there than the captain did,” he joked, waving toward the only full-sized double bed aboard. “Perks of being the captain’s pet.”

“Don’t that make you jealous of the cap’n’s dog?”

“Well I’ve always fancied the idea of being able to lick my own balls,” Malcolm agreed mildly, savouring the resultant explosive flush and incoherent stutter from the better half of his soul. “But I’ve got you to do that for me these days…”

“Whenever you want, lover.” The gentle, mischievous makeout session he’d been imagining wasn’t enough anymore. Tucker’s throat worked. Hard.

The air tasted different. Thicker, Reed realised, as if the air conditioning units had chosen that exact moment to cut out. It was getting warmer.

And the only heat-source he could locate was those beautiful boggling blue eyes. 

“We. Can’t,” he croaked.

“Momma’d say there’s no such word.”

“In the captain’s quarters?” Damn, he could feel every single goosebump emerging in slow motion.

“I’m the cap’n now.”

“So you are.”

This was madness. Enterprise was crawling with brass-hats, and those were Jonathan Archer’s pristine sheets. But with Charles Tucker the Third’s dark aqua eyes almost burning the clothes from his body and his balls – oh, his poor, needy balls, all bubbling and tender – tight at the mere thought of that wicked dancing tongue…

The unthinkable, Reed discovered, was in fact the irresistible.

It got even more so when strong arms wrapped around his waist and trim hips dipped, aligning a familiar weight and warmth with his tender groin. “Triip,” he wheedled, chin already lifted for his husband’s kiss. 

“’s mah name, lover.” He couldn’t help it. This was supposed to be a seduction, but the minute he felt that lithe, muscular length squirming in his arms Tucker forgot the subtleties. His knees gave way. Together the two men tumbled onto the nearest comfortable flat surface.

_Jon’s bed._

Blunt fingertips slipped between shirt buttons, their first touch setting off sparklers under the skin. Malcolm bucked beneath him, a formless cry escaping at a particularly strong jolt of friction against his tender phallus. Blindly he tugged his husband’s waistband, forcing the material down those lovely lean jutting hips right at the same time his shirt front came apart and the wiry scrape of chest hair overloaded the last of his internal sensors.

“Easy darlin’.” Tourists. Cadets and schoolkids gazing in awe at the great Captain Archer’s bunk tomorrow. Enveloped in an eager Reed he couldn’t focus on those important details but they floated around the base of Trip’s skull all the same, like irritating siblings that just didn’t know when to butt out. On the second attempt he managed to snatch the crisp square of folded cloth from Malcolm’s top pocket, hyper-sensitive to its starchy flutter against his clammy fingers. “Gotta take care ‘f business now.”

Glassy grey eyes rolled. A long, ecstatic “ _Yeesssss!_ ” slipped between kiss-bruised lips. Rolling as fluid and constant as the Pacific against the bay Malcolm spilled in long, rhythmic spurts, drenching the cloth and his husband’s flexing hand with his heat.

“Attaboy.” The raw beauty of the man in that single suspended moment was more than Trip could stand. His limbs began to shake. His synapses shut down. On a long, hoarse groan he went hard over the edge and into his love.

The sticky handkerchief chafed between their bellies. Semen seeped. Potent musk rose to swirl through the ventilation shafts. Slumped over his husband, tickled by half-mast pants and the lazy flap of shirt fronts Trip squirmed, mindlessly encouraging the seductive ooze. Malcolm purred beneath him, long hands roving aimlessly under his clothes. Time ticked. He didn’t care if it stopped altogether.

“Trip?”

“Uuuh?"

“Did we just have sex where a hundred gormless brats are going to queue for photos tomorrow?”

Laughter. It was right there at the back of Malcolm’s voice. “Guess we did.”

“I hope the admiral’s left some aftershave in the cupboard.”

He couldn’t help it. Trip snickered.

Three minutes later, mopping vainly at his streaming eyes, he dragged himself upright and yanked a crumpled handkerchief from his pants pocket to flap helplessly at the dampness glistening across his husband’s torso, then his own. “You wanna straighten the sheets while I fix the airflow?” he sputtered, hefting the brunet up in his wake. Malcolm grinned.

“I can’t believe we did that,” he said.

“Let’s hope nobody else believes we’d do it either.” Trusting his partner’s ingrained neat-freakery to handle the room itself Trip shot a blast of pure oxygen through the cabin then whipped around, adding three swift sprays of Jon’s favourite cologne to the cleansing mix. “Good?”

Malcolm nodded. “Good. Now, perhaps we should escape the scene of the crime?”

Go back to the overheated mess. Chew inedible food and smile at strangers. Letting his hand be captured in a caressing grip Trip surrendered to the inevitable in the certain knowledge it couldn’t last long.

“’nother thirty minutes?” he bargained.

Not for the first time he discovered his master tactician was one step ahead. “Less, if the Cap – beg pardon, the Admiral – has anything to do with it,” Malcolm parried, giving the room a final check before guiding the tall blond out the door. “After you, Captain.”

“Ah love it when y’ talk dirty, Commander!”

Malcolm’s laughter chased him down the hall and into the turbolift. _Hey, did we ever get it on in here? I’m gonna have to bring him back on one of those tours someday…_


End file.
